


For Those in Danger of Being Left Behind

by Wheat From Chaff (wheatfromchaff)



Series: How They Met Themselves [3]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games), Tales from the Borderlands - Fandom
Genre: Blood and Injury, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, M/M, Obligatory Beach Episode, who wants to read more melancholy gay bullshit by yours truly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-08-07
Packaged: 2018-12-12 12:06:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11736702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wheatfromchaff/pseuds/Wheat%20From%20Chaff
Summary: What was the life expectancy of a vault hunter?





	For Those in Danger of Being Left Behind

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sailorfuckthisshit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sailorfuckthisshit/gifts).



> based around a prompt i got on my tumblr... quite a while ago. from [sailorfuckthisshit](http://sailorfuckthisshit.tumblr.com): _For a prompt would you be so kind to do some Tim and Rhys fluff for the Met Themselves verse after Tim has already come back to Atlas?_
> 
> I don't even know if this qualifies. For some reason I got it into my head to write them going out on a date and then it became..... this.
> 
> This story takes place after the final scene of _How They Met Themselves_. I'm pretty sure you need to read that and possibly _Lamp of Memory_ before you read this.

What was the life expectancy of a vault hunter?

The question kept up with Rhys while he worked from home for three days. Yvette had told him he could take the time completely off if he wanted to, but they both knew she was lying. The limbo hours he’d spent in the finest waiting room in Opportunity and then seated beside a hospital bed were already more than they could afford. Atlas was an open mouth, an empty stomach, a hunger that would never be satisfied, and Rhys could pour the rest of his life down that throat and it wouldn’t be enough. It would just keep growing.

He could remember thinking about it like that, while he sat on a beige chair in a beige room, listening to the hissing of scrub-clad legs walking back and forth, to the sound of doors whispering open and shut, to quiet voices speaking complicated terms. Rhys had thought he could smell blood in the air, but that couldn’t have been right. Tim couldn’t have spent more than two seconds in this room, the amount of time it took them to race him from the front to the doors that lead to the surgical theatre.

He was coming to terms with what Atlas would take from him, what it would need, now. He thought about what he was willing to give it. He thought about his future.

What was the life expectancy of a vault hunter?

The question kept him company while he prepared their meals every day, following the recipes Tim’s doctor had given them, all of which called for different ingredients but all somehow ended up looking the same; a thick off-beige sludge that smelled of yeast. Like Tim’s doctor came up with an elaborate ruse to feed Tim bread dough and nothing else. Maybe he had. Maybe bread dough was the perfect meal for someone with shredded guts.

Tim sat at the island, perched gingerly on a tall stool, and watched Rhys work every time. He watched Rhys’ hands, watched him chop and add vegetables to steaming water, watched him boil all the colour and flavour clean out of them. He talked a little, but the pain meds made him dozy. The regenerative fluids—a milder, gentler cousin to the Anshin hypos Tim wasn’t allowed to use anymore—made him weak.

Tim could barely string together three words, but he stayed with Rhys while he worked. Rhys wanted to think he was just keeping him company, and maybe that was part of it.

But Tim watched Rhys' hands. He watched closely when Rhys prepared their food. He made sure Rhys poured them both a measure from the same pot. He watched closest of all when Rhys brought out the prescription bottles.

The first time, Rhys gave Tim his pills without really thinking about it. He set them, three of them, beside Tim’s bowl of beige sludge. Tim stared at them, glassy-eyed, lips pressed tight. He took them, his hands trembling, and didn’t speak much for the rest of the night. He limped to the bedroom when he was finished, breathing hard and barely saying a word to Rhys.

Rhys found him there a few hours later, curled up under the sheets and whimpering in his sleep.

After that, Rhys would hand Tim the bottles. Tim double-checked the labels every time.

It wasn’t that Tim didn’t trust Rhys, of course. Of course Tim trusted Rhys. He trusted him enough to live in a city built, designed, and programmed under the authority of a man who controlled and ruined every aspect of Tim’s life. But…

Rhys decided not to take Tim’s vigilance personally. After three days, Tim began to relax. On the fourth day, Tim sat at the island with a tablet in his hand, a glow on his face. He was watching a sitcom about cats. His favourite.  

Rhys listened to two talking cats arguing about renewable fishing practices in Aquator while he worked. He thought about their future.

As the days wore on, they were able to wean Tim off of his meds. He haunted the apartment like a surly ghost, dressed in his new t-shirts, his new sweats, because everything that was his was new.

Pain tightened every line on his face. It robbed him of his appetite. It clipped his words. It made his gaze flick away from Rhys’ face, pulled his shoulders and chest in, made him slump over even when he stood. It leeched the colour from his face. Shadows lived in the soft pouches just under his eyes, in the hollows of his face.

It made him look old.

It wouldn’t last, Rhys told himself. This was just a rough patch, brought on by an accident in the field. A stray crystalisk projectile, exploding at Tim’s feet and filling him with yellow shrapnel.

Rhys could still picture the silver tray, piled with yellow crystals the size and width of sewing needles. He could still hear the sound they made when they were dropped by blood-stained, silver instruments. A sound that repeated over and over, until Rhys couldn’t stand it anymore. Until he made a dizzy circuit around the observation room, ignoring whatever it was the nurse tried to tell him, and left to find some place filled with a wall of sound, where he could build a room of silence between his ears. Where Rhys could think about their future.

* * *

What was the life expectancy of a vault hunter?

Anshins helped them stay alive, Rhys knew, but they weren’t a permanent solution. You could abuse them, and your body would suffer from it. The human body needed to feel pain, or so Tim’s doctor informed him. The human body needed to heal naturally, or as naturally as it possibly could. His liver needed it. His kidneys needed it. He couldn’t go on the way he’d been going on forever.

When Tim told Rhys that they’d recommended he stay off Anshins for a year, his lips twisting as if the words tasted sour, Rhys kissed him on the mouth, unable to contain his glee. He thought of it as the first step.

Rhys didn’t want to think about the past, but his mind kept bringing him back to that night. As he sat on their couch, Tim’s head a warm, solid weight in his lap, he thought about the moment Tim had told him. How Tim had scowled even when Rhys kissed him, although not for long.

Rhys wound his fingers through Tim’s hair as he stared without seeing at the screens projected above his hand. A television show played on low volume on the wall screen, but Tim had been dozing for the last hour, lulled to sleep by what few pain meds he was still required to take.

Rhys tried to think about their future. He tried to cast his thoughts into the next pages of the calendar, struggled to shake the weight of everything that had come before. The future required a light step. It required the buoyancy of optimism. Rhys pictured the next five years, and everything he wanted. For Atlas, for Opportunity, for Pandora. For himself.

Tim. It was always Tim.

Tim stirred under Rhys’ hand. He mumbled something about the time.

“It’s early, still. Not even 8pm,” Rhys said.

“Ugh.” Tim pushed himself upright. The hair on one side of his head stuck up like a fence around the neighbourhood of his skull. He squinted at the screen like he suspected it of talking about him behind his back. He aimed that look at Rhys, at the screens floating above his palm.

When Tim’s dosage was higher, he’d wake from his naps looking and feeling disoriented, like he’d stumbled without taking a step. He’d push Rhys away when Rhys would try to reach out to steady him. He’d turn his head away, aim his wild-eyed gaze to the floor, to the windows, to the things he’d put up on their living room shelf. Rhys would talk to him in a low voice.

 _“You’re in Atlas, in Opportunity. You’re living with me, remember? Our apartment on the seventh floor. Remember how you said I was the only CEO in the history of the universe who didn’t insist on a penthouse?_ ” He would talk until Tim’s shoulders began to slump, setting down words like boards across a bridge, leading Tim home.

“Are you still working?” Tim asked, frowning.

Rhys didn’t realise how tense he was until he began to relax.

“Just a few things,” Rhys said. Tim looked at the screens like he was trying to read them. “I’m almost finished.”

“You haven’t been in the office in almost two weeks, have you? Must be a record.” Tim tipped his head to the side, stretching out his probably stiff neck.

“I don’t know about that,” Rhys said, although he suspected Tim might be right.

Tim kneaded at the juncture between his shoulder and neck. He stared at the wall screen. “You must be getting sick of this place. With the windows closed all the time. We’re being invaded by gloom. It’s coming out of the walls. This is what happens when you shut up pain like this.” His eyes were glazed over, his words loose. “Four walls do good a job containing it, but it’s too good. Pain’ll stick around even after it should’ve gone. Lives here like a mold. You can smell it in the damp.”

“Do you… want me to open the windows more often?” Rhys tried.

Tim sighed. He let his head fall back on the couch. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m saying. I hate these pills. I’m so fucking sick of being in pain. I wish you’d just let me take an Anshin.”

Rhys wouldn’t argue with Tim. There was no point to it. Tim wouldn’t get his way, and they both knew it was for the best. He was just frustrated.

“Do you want to watch something else?” Rhys asked, dismissing his screens. “A movie? More of your cat show?”

Tim closed his eyes. “No. I should just go to bed.”

“Are you sure?” But Rhys couldn’t deny he was relieved. With Tim so miserable, it was better to see him rest. Rhys tried to convince himself that it was for the best that Tim sleep off these bad days.

Tim nodded. He pushed himself up from the couch, and Rhys was hit with the medicinal, floral scent that clung to Tim like a second skin. The scent of the topical gel the doctors had given them, the stuff he had to slather on the still-tender mended skin of his stomach. The gel was designed to keep the skin grafts from splitting, but Rhys knew that there would still be a scar. They had to cut him open to pull all those needles out.

“Goodnight, Rhys.” He bent carefully to kiss Rhys, one hand pressed against his stomach. Rhys half-rose from his seat to meet him, to keep the angle between them gentle.

He could do a lot more for Tim, he knew. But at that moment, that felt like the best he could manage.

Alone in their living room, Rhys stared out at the glow of Elpis and thought about their future.

* * *

That night, Rhys gave into temptation and looked up information on the other vault hunters. The first results for each one was inevitably their criminal record, a list of their bad deeds, of everything they did and still hadn’t done time for.

They were young, most of them. Younger than Tim, certainly. Some were even younger than Rhys. Rhys was appalled to learn that one was eighteen years old.

The closest one in age to Tim was Athena, who was 37. And she’d retired.

Rhys considered calling Janey, but a quick glance at the time told him that might be a bad idea. He really didn’t need to hear what she would tell him, anyway. He already knew what he had to do. What he had to ask. It was over-due.

Rhys rubbed at his stinging eyes and sighed. He couldn’t ask Tim right now, not when misery and pain dogged his steps. He wouldn’t listen. He might try to fight Rhys just out of frustration.

Or worse, he might just agree. Roll over and let Rhys tell him what to do.

Rhys looked around his living room, lit only by the blue light of the screen. Maybe Tim was right. This place was starting to get to him, too. It felt like a third presence had come into their little world. A guest at their dinner table that neither of them could afford to feed, but it ate regardless.

It was getting to be too much. Something would have to change. He gave it some thought.

He opened up a new screen.

* * *

“Good morning!” Rhys said as Tim padded into the kitchen. “How was your sleep?”

“S’okay.” Tim rubbed at his eyes, sniffing. “No weird dreams last night.”

That was good. Tim’s ‘weird’ dreams had gotten worse after he’d come home from the hospital. Rhys had found Tim at their front door on their second night home, half-asleep and drugged to the gills, fumbling with the controls. Trying to escape a cage Rhys never built.

Tim gripped Rhys’ shoulder, leaned carefully to give him a peck on the cheek.

“Good morning,” he said.

Rhys wanted nothing more than to turn off the stove, turn around, wrap his arms around Tim’s waist and make it a proper good morning. He stifled the urge, reminding himself that Tim’s recovery took precedence over his libido.

“I’ve got some good news,” Rhys said as he handed Tim a bowl of his balanced breakfast.

Tim made a pleased noise at the back of his throat. “Are these berries in my oatmeal? And nuts? I can eat raw foods now?”

He looked so happy it made Rhys’ heart flutter. “Some,” he confirmed, dropping a kiss at the corner of Tim’s lips. “This is day fourteen of your recovery, hot stuff. A whole new world of food is available to you.”

“Food with colour,” Tim said with a happy sigh. “Food that tastes like something.”

“I know it’s been hard for you,” Rhys said as he took his seat. “Being an invalid sucks. I get it. The hardest part’s over with, at least.”

“Thank god.” The words came out muffled. Rhys was pleased to see him dig in so eagerly, his appetite revived by the sight of colour in his bowl. Rhys felt more certain about his plan.

“How are you feeling today?” Rhys asked, taking the seat opposite Tim.

“Better,” Tim said, popping a slice of drake fruit into his mouth. “The pain didn’t wake me up this morning, which was nice.”

“I’m glad. I have more good news for you,” Rhys said. Tim raised an eyebrow. “After your shower, I’ve got a surprise for you.”

Tim raised his other eyebrow, his lips curling into a smile. “Oh?” He licked his spoon. “Will I need to get dressed for this… ‘surprise’ of yours?”

Rhys sighed. “Unfortunately, yes.”

“Shame.”

“It is.” It was the greatest misfortune anyone’d had ever gone through. “But I think you’ll like what I’ve got in mind.”

“I think I like what I’ve got in mind more,” Tim said with an exaggerated waggle of his eyebrows.

Rhys probably did, too. “Go get cleaned up and get dressed in something comfortable but appropriate to be seen in. I’ll pack us a bag while you’re in the shower.”

Some light returned to Tim’s eyes. “A bag? Are we going out?”

Rhys grinned. “It’s a surprise. Eat your breakfast.”

Tim scraped up the last of his oatmeal, set his bowl in the sink, and hobbled off towards their bathroom. Rhys tidied up while the dishwasher ran. He pulled back every curtain, opened every window.

Maybe Tim had been right. Maybe the gloom had started to grow, because Rhys could feel its absence. Golden sunlight took its place, the sound of the ocean just outside, the feel of the salt-tipped breeze, cool and refreshing. They’d spent too long shut up in this place.

* * *

“You know, you putting my swim trunks out on the bed? Kind of spoils some of the surprise of our destination.”

Tim sauntered into the living room, dressed in a white tanktop the teal swimming trunks he’d ordered after receiving his second paycheque.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Rhys said, biting back a smile. “It’s a surprise. You’ll be very surprised.”

“Uh huh. Nice shades.” Tim tapped the golden frames of Rhys’ aviators. “Should I put on sunscreen before we visit your mystery location?”

* * *

It could’ve been worse, Rhys knew. The shrapnel could’ve hit Tim’s lungs, his heart. One stray needle could’ve punctured his jugular. He could’ve bled out there, in the dripping yellow jaws of the Caustic Caverns. They could’ve sent him home in a bag.

It could’ve been worse. It could’ve been a Thresher that got him, stuck him full of venomous spines. It could’ve been a varkid, spitting acid into his eyes. That whole place was filled with poison. Lakes of greenish yellow ooze he could’ve fallen into. It would’ve eaten right through his shield, and then his clothes, and then his skin and everything underneath. There could’ve been nothing left to send home.

It could’ve been worse. Rhys couldn’t stop thinking about all the ways it could’ve been worse.

* * *

“Ta-dah!” Rhys threw his arms out. “Welcome to the beautiful Sapphire Lagoon, a soon-to-be Atlas-sponsored high-end resort.”

“It’s a beach,” Tim said. “What a surprise.”

A ring of powder-fine white sand surrounded a crystal pool, calmer than the ocean that lapped at the island’s shore. The lagoon had been discovered by an enterprising Pandoran with an eye for real estate development.

“It’s a _very nice_ beach,” Rhys said, nudging him with care. “And you are surprised, admit it.”

Tim gave him a familiar smile. He flicked Rhys’ ear. “Maybe.” He looked around the small spit of land. “Where’s the resort?”

“Not built yet,” Rhys replied as he stripped down to his black swim shorts, setting his white linen romper carefully down beside their picnic basket and bag of supplies. “The developer tells me it’ll be up in about a year.”

The water was lukewarm, but with the sun beating down on them and the breeze stirring off the waves of the ocean beyond, it felt just right. Rhys lead Tim by the hand into the shallows, until the water lapped at their knees.

“You think there’ll be critters?” Tim asked, scanning the lagoon floor.

“Nothing hostile,” Rhys assured him. “The island’s too small to support anything large and angry.”

“It’s got me on it,” Tim said with a half-smile.

Rhys grinned and reeled him close. He cupped Tim’s head with both hands, leaned down and kissed the bridge of his nose, the curve of his sharp cheekbone, the corner of his lips, his mouth. Tim swayed forward, wrapped his hands around Rhys’ hips, fingers pressing into soft skin.

They kissed like they used to, when they had to spend weeks between visits. When their time apart was a drought, and Rhys felt convinced he’d die of thirst. It felt like it’d been years since the accident, since Tim got sliced open on the operating table and stayed that way for almost four hours.

Rhys didn’t realise just how badly he needed this until he could feel Tim’s hands on his waist, his lips hot against Rhys’ neck.

“You feeling angry right now, Tim?” Rhys asked teasingly.

“Not at the moment,” Tim murmured, lips brushing against Rhys’ tattoo. His hands slipped over Rhys’ ass. “These shorts are gonna be trouble, though.”

Rhys hummed, arching into his boyfriend’s embrace. “I could take ‘em off if you’d like.”

Tim groaned and dropped his head onto Rhys’ shoulder. “I would like that. But we can’t. Can we?”

Rhys gnawed his lip. He wanted to say yes, of course he did. Especially with Tim still holding him, his voice so nakedly hopeful.

Tim was two weeks into his healing regimen, but that wasn’t enough. Rhys knew he was pouting.

“Maybe not out here,” he said, drawing his fingers down Tim’s t-shirt. “Not while that hole in your belly still needs to heal.”

Tim kissed Rhys’ shoulder. “But maybe later? I know you’ve gotten used to the way I rock your whole world apart—” Rhys laughed. “—but we can take it easy. And, you know, if you’re worried about cleanliness, or fluids, we can be careful about that too. Not every race has to hit the finish line, if you know what I mean.”

“You’ve been thinking about this for a while,” Rhys guessed.

Tim kissed him again, and Rhys thought he might’ve been trying to prove a point. It was needless. Rhys was more than happy to melt into it, to concede. If every disagreement could find such a sweet resolution, even Pandora would look awfully different.

“Maybe,” Tim admitted, after.

* * *

Tim retreated to their towels and beach umbrellas, to reapply another layer of sunscreen on his calves, and read some trashy vampire porn on his ECHOtab. Rhys stayed out in the water, practising his deadman’s float.

The sun was everything he needed in that moment. Warm and pure, soaking past his skin and into his very bones, where the memories of his childhood home lived. If only a rainstorm could blow in and wreck the place in the span of a half-hour, it would be perfect.

The sun had slipped past its zenith the next time Rhys opened his eyes. He startled a bit, his legs splashing as he regained his footing under him, struggling to orient himself. He sought the shoreline for a panicked moment, but there was nothing to worry about. Tim was under the umbrellas, where Rhys had left him.

“Have a nice swim?” Tim asked as Rhys approached.

“I think I fell asleep,” Rhys admitted as he brushed the sand off of his legs.

Tim set the tablet onto his chest, peered up at Rhys over the rim of his reading glasses. “Did you dream?”

Probably, although Rhys couldn’t remember the details. He could only remember the sense of panic, like he’d closed his eyes and gotten lost. Or lost something.

“I did. I dreamt about us in that lagoon.” Rhys wrapped himself in his beach towel, and lay down on their shared blanket. “I dreamt you lost your shirt. You lost all of them in a fire.”

“Tragic.”

Rhys stretched out beside him. “You had to go shirtless all the time. Someone passed a law. They elected me mayor of Pandora and I made it illegal for you to wear shirts.” He set his hand on Tim’s stomach, mindful of the pressure. He could feel the softness of the thermal bandage sealed over the wound, feel the heat of the medicinal gel through all the layers.

Tim’s lips twitched. “You tyrant. What if it gets cold?”

“That never came up,” Rhys said. Tim was edging closer. Rhys curled towards him. “We lived in the lagoon. We ate all the fish we could catch, and all the fruit on the trees.”

Tim bumped his nose against Rhys’ cheek. “What kind of fruit?” His lips brushed against Rhys’ skin.

“Coconuts. Kumquats.” Rhys turned his head to offer Tim better access. “Uh. Blueberries.”

Tim’s laughter was a silent exhale, a puff of warmth like a kiss across Rhys’ face. “I don’t think those are tropical, my love.”

 _Oh_. That little name, it still made Rhys’ toes curl. The first time Tim used it, Rhys felt it like a struck chord, like his body had become an instrument tuned to Tim’s voice. He couldn’t not kiss him.

He still couldn’t. He cupped Tim’s cheek, pulled them together.

Rhys brushed his fingers down Tim’s stomach, to the small peek of skin between the hem of his shirt and the waistband of his trunks. He wanted to make things more interesting.

Tim’s hands travelled down Rhys’ back, down to his waist. Rhys brushed his tongue against Tim’s and tried to think of logistics. Maybe if he straddled Tim’s hips? But any vigorous thrusting on either of their parts could tear the new skin. Maybe if he held Tim’s hips down and used his mouth? But even that ran a risk. In theory, Tim could use his mouth on Rhys, but Rhys didn’t like the idea of forcing his injured boyfriend to give him a blowjob.

“What’s wrong?” Tim asked.

“Nothing.” Rhys sighed and rested his head on Tim’s shoulder. “I just wish you didn’t have that big hole in your stomach.”

“You and me both, stretch,” Tim said, wrapping his arm around Rhys’ shoulders.

Somewhere along the way, Rhys had ended up half-draped across Tim’s chest, his body curled around the tender wound like a closing bracket. He brought his hand back to Tim’s stomach, light as a butterfly wing.

They lay in silence. Rhys watched the waves of the distant shore, the sun skimming white across their peaks. It hurt his eyes, but he didn’t look away. He listened to the sound of the ocean, a rhythm he knew as well as he knew himself. The same tune on any planet.

“This was a good idea,” Tim said quietly, his lips brushing Rhys’ hair. Rhys smiled.

“All my ideas are good ones,” he said.

“Being cooped up was starting to get to me. Between the meds and the same four walls… I kept losing time on those fucking pills. I’d wake up forgetting where I was.” He swallowed. “Sometimes I forgot when I was.”

Rhys could remember, with high-definition clarity, just what happened to Tim when he woke up for the first time in the hospital. The way he whimpered when Rhys tried to soothe him, the way he looked at Rhys with eyes like stained glass.

_“I wasn’t ready… This isn’t… You said… you promised me… When we talked, you said… Twenty years…”_

Rhys imagined he would carry that memory like a stone around his neck until the day he died.

“I’m sorry if I’ve said something… something that wasn’t meant for you.” Tim sounded uncomfortable. “This whole experience has just been a bit of a struggle for me. I’m sorry I’ve been so Sylvia Plath about all this.”

“I don’t know who that is,” Rhys said.

Tim sighed, a warm gust of air across Rhys’ head. “Jesus. I can’t believe I fell for someone who’s never read poetry in his entire life.”

“I like some poetry,” Rhys said defensively. “I like stuff with floating heads and piano music.”

“Visual poetry?” Tim sounded exactly like all of Rhys’ old academy professors. Disappointed and withering. “That corporate-sponsored stuff companies put out to advertise cars and shit?”

“It’s catchy.” Tim snorted. “Isn’t art supposed to make me feel something?”

“And what do you feel, when you watch a falcon dive into a nebula to hunt a mouse driving a car across tree tops?”

Rhys gave it serious thought. “Motivated to buy the latest electronic razor.”

Tim groaned, his arm flopping loose from Rhys’ back, his head hitting the blanket. “I hate that. This can’t continue. You need to read a real poem at some point.”

“Ugh.”

“Or an actual novel.”

“ _Ugh_.”

“How can you expect me to share my life with someone who only reads Business Insider articles and status updates on social media, Rhys?”

Rhys’ heart squeezed.

The future was uncharted territory. It was where the ocean was its deepest, its coldest, its most unknowable. Rhys could build vessels from his plans, draw up maps based on his theories, but in the end, it might not matter.

In his old home in the eastern megacity, storms could whip up in a matter of minutes, blocking out the sky and hitting the city with a torrent that could sweep away the small animals, the shacks and markets built on the river’s edge. Rhys never saw them coming.

“I want you to stop vault hunting,” Rhys said.

Tim raised his head. “What?”

Rhys took a breath. He didn’t know where this might take him—take them both—but he knew he had to try. “I want you to stop vault hunting.”

“Rhys, I haven’t hunted a vault in almost eight years.”

Rhys flushed. “You know what I mean. I want you to stop getting shot at by bandits, or attacked by monsters. I want you to stop putting yourself in dangerous situations, the sort of situations that lead to getting your torso ripped open.” His voice caught on ‘torso ripped open’ like it was barbed.

The image of Tim on the stretcher being moved through the hospital so quickly his face was nothing more than an impression, red-black on white, kept surfacing in the murk of Rhys’ mind every night as he tried sleep. Rhys could still remember the tap-tap-tap of blood dripping off the side.

“I don’t want you to come home like that again. I don’t…”

His throat spasmed around his words, warping his voice. He hid his face in Tim’s chest, sucking in a deep breath that smelled like laundry soap, warm sand and coconut sunscreen.

“Hey…” Tim stroked Rhys’ hair, rubbed his thumb against the back of his neck. “Hey, Rhys, sweetheart…”

Rhys didn’t reply. He hated when he got like this. How could anyone expect to have a rational conversation when he was like this?

Tim’s fingers wound through his hair. “Rhys, please look at me.”

He sat them both up, taking Rhys by the shoulders and pushing him gently back. Rhys sniffed and stared at Tim’s shirt, desperate to pull himself together.

“Sweetheart.” Tim tipped his chin up, kissed his wet cheek. “Darling. My love.” He peppered his face with light kisses. “I’m sorry. It must’ve been so awful to see me like that.”

Rhys shuddered, and closed his eyes.

“I want you to stop,” Rhys said. Tim sighed and sat back. “Why is this even a question? You’re almost 40. You should be glad to retire.”

“At 40? You think I should be hung up on the shelf at 40?” Tim asked.

“No one’s hanging anyone up. You can do something else,” Rhys said.

Tim turned away from Rhys. “I don’t know if you’ve figured this out yet, Rhys, but there’s nothing else I’m good at.”

“That’s not true. You can write.” Tim snorted. “You were in administration before. You could try that again.”

“That was more than fifteen years ago,” Tim said.

“So? You could still do it,” Rhys said while Tim shook his head. “You could do anything. Atlas always needs people. I can put you anywhere. I could put you at the head of a department. People already expect me to play favourites with my boy toy.” Tim ducked his head, smiling. “Or you could just write. There’s a whole galaxy of people who want to read something new. I can support us both while you work on that.”

Tim said nothing and Rhys bit back on everything else he wanted to say. He wanted to take Tim by the shoulders and shake him for being so stupid, so stubborn.

“Can I ask why you want to keep vault hunting?” Rhys asked when the silence became too much.

Tim didn’t reply immediately. Rhys chewed on his lip, kept his hands in tight fists on his thighs. He could wait. He could always be patient for Tim.

When Tim finally spoke, his spoke slowly, and Rhys got the impression he was choosing his words with care. “It’s the only thing I’ve ever been any good at,” he said again. “It’s... the only thing anyone’s ever found value in me for.” He looked over at Rhys. His throat worked in a swallow. “Remember how we first met? Even you, Rhys.”

 _Even you_. Rhys had to fight the urge to flinch from those words. A lot of ugly sentiment rose in his chest, the sort of things he might fling into Tim’s face for that assumption. He washed them away with a long inhale.

“I am telling you,” Rhys said, “that I want you to stop. It doesn’t matter how I felt back then. This is how I feel now. I want to grow old with you, Tim. I want to build a life with you. I want to watch you turn soft and grey.” Fuck, his voice was shaking again, but Rhys couldn’t bring himself to stop. “How am I supposed to do that if you’re— If something happens to you?”

Tim’s expression crumpled. He ducked his head onto Rhys’ shoulder. “Shit, Rhys.”

Rhys curled around him, wrapping his arms around his shoulders. He knelt his head down, pressed the soft curve of his cheek against the ridge of Tim’s shoulder blade. He wondered what they might’ve looked like from above. If it should rain, Rhys would be the one getting wet.

* * *

It didn’t rain. The sun stayed with them like a cheerful companion while they ate soft, unsalted biscuits, raw pistachios, sliced apples. The sort of snack Rhys might’ve enjoyed in pre-school. He wished for a bottle of wine, especially when Tim would fall silent, but it didn’t feel right to drink without him.

They talked. Tim could be stubborn, but he wasn’t unreasonable. He listened to Rhys’ concerns, to the blueprints of their future he’d been sketching out for them, and didn’t say much.

“I meant what I said,” Rhys told him. “I can put you anywhere in Atlas. You don’t have to give up your teaching position with the security personnel.”

“I don’t know if I would be comfortable telling people how to get shot at while knowing I won't be out there in the field to watch their backs,” Tim said.

Rhys knocked his feet against Tim’s. “We can keep you on the security team. Instead of crawling around monster-infested poison caverns, you could just stay at the home office. Maybe I could make you my personal bodyguard.”

Tim huffed. “That’s how I started at this company.”

“It’s where you’re best suited.” Rhys lay back, stretching out like a cat luxuriating in the sun. “Watching over all this.” He gestured to the expanse of fish-belly skin and blue tattoos.

“I don’t think we’d get a lot work done,” Tim said, leaning over Rhys with a grin.

“That’s a sacrifice I might be willing to make,” Rhys replied.

They packed up as the sun began to set. Tim helped, but Rhys noticed the way the lines of his face tightened every time he bent over, the careful way he moved. They were pushing their luck. Tim needed his medication.

As they walked through the sandbanks, back towards the Atlas-locked fast travel machine Rhys had specifically built for his future resort, Tim threw his arm around Rhys’ shoulders and pulled him close.

“This was good, Rhys,” he said. “I’m glad you brought me out.”

“We’ll have to come back,” Rhys said. “I’ve been thinking about us in that lagoon. Seems like next time we should invite some photographers. What do you think? We could probably make an advertisement campaigned for this placed based entire around our make out session.”

Tim shook his head with a rueful smile. “I think that’s not the best idea.”

“We should still come back, though. Your thermal pads run out in another week, and the doctors say your new tissue will be settled by then.”

“Proper tissue instead of tissue paper.” Tim sounded wistful.

Rhys leaned down and kissed him on the cheek. “We can celebrate.”

“Sounds like a good idea, stretch.”

Tim stopped when they arrived at the fast travel. He turned towards the horizon, where the sun had set the sky on fire. The orange-pink light on his face made him look like something out of a myth. A golden statue pulled out of a ruined temple, a hero from some forgotten civilization.

“I’m going to think about what you said today, Rhys.” He looked at Rhys, right in his eyes. “I promise. Whatever I decide, I want you to know that I won’t go back out into the field the way I used to. Things are gonna change.”

“Oh, _thank god._ ” Rhys slumped forward, wrapping his arms around Tim’s shoulders, limbs weightless and limp under the strength of his relief. Tim stumbled backwards, laughing.

“That’s all I wanted,” Rhys said. “Well, it’s not all I wanted, but it’s good. Thank you, Tim.”

“You don’t have to thank me for this.” Tim pulled him close, cupped his face with one hand. “I’m taking this relationship seriously, Rhys. I want you to know that.”

“I know it.” Rhys turned his head into Tim’s palm, brushing his lips against his skin. “I love you.”

If Tim’s ‘my love’ could put Rhys in the hospital, Rhys wondered if maybe that phrase had a similar effect on Tim. He pulled Rhys into a kiss, his skin burning with urgency.

“Love you too, boss,” Tim said, grinning.

**Author's Note:**

> i mean it's a happy ending so that counts as fluff, right? right????
> 
> Do you want to receive a fanfic that is only tangentially related to a prompt you sent in two months ago? boy do i have the [tumblr for you](http://nothingbutchaff.tumblr.com).


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